Ideas for Educators

Peer Support Cards

10/26/2021

Co-teaching can be such a creative process! When partners combine their expertise and problem-solving skills, they generate unique solutions to classroom challenges. Peer Support Cards were the brainchild of Joey Tilton and Anthony Kresto, partners in a middle school math course. Even with two adults in the room, they found that more students needed assistance than the partners could always provide. They created a simple yet effective peer support strategy using colored index cards.

First, they designed the independent math work in a hierarchy of difficulty. As students finished level one, they asked a teacher to check it. If correct, they were given a #1 card and continued their work. Any other student in the room could then approach a peer with a #1 card for assistance with a level one problem. (Same for level two, three, etc.)

On the back of the index cards was a hierarchy of questions for the peer-supporter so that they could guide the student needing help, rather than just providing the answer.

Hierarchy of Questions

“Did you read the directions?”
“Do you understand what you are supposed to do?”
“What strategies have you tried?”
“What is a strategy we just discussed?”
“Did you try ________?”
Ask more detailed, problem specific questions, such as, “What color do we highlight negative numbers?”

This card system increased student collaboration and allowed both teachers to spend additional time with students in need of direct instruction or re-teaching.

Thanks to Mr. Tilton and Mr. Kresto for allowing me to share their idea with teachers around the world!

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Executive Function Tool

9/8/2021

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Here is one of the ideas from my contribution to Larry Ferlazzo's column in EdWeek.

Executive functions are essential to managing change, including a return to brick and mortar schooling. Because many students with disabilities have weaknesses in this area, take time to identify which executive functions are needed for the return to school. Will they need to learn new organizational methods? Will they struggle with sustained attention? Will self-regulation strategies be different in person? A simple chart can help you reflect and plan for proactive instruction or accommodations to meet executive-function needs.

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Highly Engaging Variation of 4 Corners for Review

6/2/2021

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This year I was fortunate to watch a highly engaging review activity in a co-taught lesson on author's purpose. The partners did a virtual variation of a 4 corners routine.

Create slides with four quadrants.
Number the quadrants 1, 2, 3, and 4.
Place questions, problems or statements in three of the quadrants, leaving one blank on each slide.
Explain to students that they will be choosing a number before viewing the slide. If they choose the empty quadrant, they get a pass or point.
Direct students to chat in or voice their choice.
Reveal the slide and note which students get a pass or point.
Ask the other students to help work through the question, statement or problem of their chosen number.

The students were very engaged in this gamified review activity! I am so inspired by the creativity I see teachers using every day to help students stay engaged in the virtual environment. And the great news for me is that this activity can be used in brick and mortar settings, too!

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A Twist on Word Banks to Boost Learning

5/14/2021

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Round Lake School District co-teachers Kyle Monestero and Terry Beake decided to boost the math language component of note-taking. For this lesson on substitution, they asked their middle school students to add a box on the right side of their notes pages and label it "Word Bank." However, instead of giving students specific words, they encouraged students to create their own list of synonyms or related terms that help them to understand the concept. As they practice this over time, the teachers can encourage students to use this note-taking strategy in other classes.

This strategy has so many potential benefits. Research shows that exploring synonyms helps learners understand the key term in more depth. We also know from research that making connections between prior knowledge and new information strengthens memory. The personalization of the strategy will boost interest and commitment to it. And it is so generalizable!

Thanks Kyle and Terry for sharing this strategy with us!

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Using JamBoard and Bull's Eyes to Teach Main Idea

5/3/2021

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Helping students to determine the main idea of a story can be a challenge. I have tried several approaches over the years, including one of my most successful – the Bull’s Eye strategy. The general method is to discuss the value of the various circles of a Bull’s Eye. The smallest center is only large enough to capture one idea, while the outer rings can hold several less important ideas. In-person, I give students sticky notes to write sentences or phrases from the text and then discuss where to place them on a Bull’s Eye drawn on the whiteboard. More details can be found here.

Recently I had the opportunity to share this idea with Felicia Fischer, an outstanding special education teacher in Round Lake Area Schools. Felicia adapted the idea for her virtual instruction, using JamBoard and YouTube. She had students watch a short video on volcanos and then modeled how to move the ideas around on JamBoard, placing the main idea in the middle.

Next, students watched a Social Studies video and practiced on their own slide with three ideas that Felicia had created in advance for them.

After several practices in this manner, with lots of class discussion, Felicia began to teach students how to generalize this strategy to text, especially when they may not have access to sticky notes or a JamBoard. Generalization instruction is always a solid sign of specially designed instruction!

Thanks, Felicia, for creatively adapting to meet your students' needs in a virtual environment!

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Spelling Practice with Letter GIFS

4/21/2021

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Check out this fantastic example of engaging students through Total Physical Response! Michael Crisantos, a first-grade special education teacher in Round Lake Area School District, created an individual GIF of himself using a gesture for each letter of the alphabet, based on a phonics program they use. He then created slides, arranging the gifs to spell words in a short sentence. This example is just a still shot I captured – wish I had video to show you – but you can still get the idea. The sentence students had to write was I see Mom.

Thanks, Michael, for the creative energy you offer your students and co-teachers on a daily basis!

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Voice Volume in a Co-Taught Hybrid Classroom

4/8/2021

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With many co-teachers returning to hybrid classrooms, teacher voice volume can be a distraction for students. For example, If Teacher A is working with a small group of students through Zoom, while in the same space Teacher B is enthusiastically instructing in-person students, Teacher B's loud voice volume may carry over to students in Zoom. Because we want enthusiastic teachers AND environments in which students can easily attend, we need to get creative about this new challenge.

Round Lake Area Schools in Illinois gathered a group of individuals to brainstorm some easy solutions. We created a short list of the most practical ideas so that partners can choose what works best for their classes. Which one will you try?

Click here for the list and feel free to share!

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Grab Student Attention With Their Own Faces

2/16/2021

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Michael Crisantos, a first-year special education teacher in Round Lake School District, used this clever trick to grab his students' attention this week. During a review of counting by tens, he replaced some of the numbers with photos of his students. When he revealed the slide, the students had to be ready to fill in the number for their spot!

Not teaching counting? I can think of several other ways to use this:

Set up any questions or work in a 2x2, 3x3 or 4x4 grid and incorporate student images to indicate who will answer that question.
If reviewing geography, remove state or country names with student photos.
Reviewing steps in a process? Add student photos to some or all of the steps.
Replace some of the images on an alphabet chart - instead of an apple for A, a student face

Thanks, Michael, for sharing this idea and for all you do for your students!

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Support for Reading Digital Texts

2/11/2021

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Students everywhere are struggling with maintaining attention to digital texts. This can occur when a teacher or student is reading aloud while the others are meant to follow along, or when they are reading independently. Of course, if the teacher or student can use highlighting tools or arrows, that can be enormously helpful, but it is not always possible.

Lately, I have found it helpful to think about how I might have addressed this if I was with students in a school building, rather than a virtual setting. If so, I might have offered them a colored acetate strip to use in their paper book. Unfortunately, most students don't have access to this type of item at home, so I tried another idea last week.

Ask students to find a scrap of paper, and fold it to approximately 6 inches by 2 inches.
Direct students to use a bold marker to draw a line along one edge, and repeat with a different color along the other edge.
Explain that they can hold it up to the screen and use it to follow along while trying to read the digital text.
Suggest they try different colors to determine what works best for them.

The touch of tactile interaction is a novel change of pace from using digital tools and increases the number of neural pathways involved in the task of digital reading. Best of all, it is simple and free!

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Improve Descriptive Writing with This Highly Engaging Strategy

11/17/2020

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Recently, I used a strategy that I originally posted about in 2013. It was a success then and proved just as effective now!

The Slow-Motion Writing Strategy teaches students to expand their descriptive writing by imagining the events taking place in slow-motion.

Ask students to write down the sentence “They sneezed.”
Show this slow-motion video clip of several different people sneezing, while pointing out specific actions students can see happening.
Ask students to rewrite their sentences with more detail.
Continue the process with Slow Motion Flying Cats, Slow Motion Water Balloon, other slow-motion videos. There are dozens of them on YouTube.
If desired, have students videotape themselves doing various actions (throwing a ball back and forth, drinking water). Then replay in slo-mo, asking students to write detailed sentences about what they see.
Ask students to find a short sentence in their own writing that would benefit from more detail. Encourage them to close their eyes and picture the action in slow-motion, then write details into their sentence(s).

Students were highly engaged and remembered the strategy over the course of several weeks. The last assessment showed that student writing was much more descriptive!

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<<Previous

Peer Support Cards

Executive Function Tool

Highly Engaging Variation of 4 Corners for Review

A Twist on Word Banks to Boost Learning

Using JamBoard and Bull's Eyes to Teach Main Idea

Spelling Practice with Letter GIFS

Voice Volume in a Co-Taught Hybrid Classroom

Grab Student Attention With Their Own Faces

Support for Reading Digital Texts

Improve Descriptive Writing with This Highly Engaging Strategy

Anne M. Beninghof

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